Although independent research shows the need for new school building at approximately $300 billion, Republican leaders apparently do not believe that the need is all that great.  Their latest "offer" would trim back the Johnson-Rangel bill from $24.8 billion in bonds over two years to less than $10 billion in bonds over three years.  Many school districts would get one-third as much help under the Republican leaders´ plan.  The Republican leaders then take the rest of the money and use it for tax breaks that do not benefit the school districts most in need of smaller class sizes. The largest part of the Republican proposal - the "arbitrage" provision - provides benefits ONLY if school districts delay construction for at least two years.  This is a tax credit to keep children in trailers for two more years rather than to build new classrooms immediately.

I also agree with Speaker Hastert when he says that we must not "waste time constructing useless political arguments."  However, that is exactly what the Republican leaders are doing when they insist that we drop the long standing policy of ensuring prevailing wage protections are provided for those who work on federally assisted school construction projects.  This is not a Democratic provision or a Republican provision.  Both the lead Republican sponsor of the bill, Nancy Johnson, and I included the provision in our separate versions of the bill.  Many of the Republican co-sponsors felt it was essential to include this provision in any bipartisan bill. 

The Republican leaders are just making excuses.  The Johnson-Rangel bill does not place any new mandates on local school districts, and it does not increase the cost of school construction.  In fact, none of this money goes through the Department of Education - all of the assistance is done through a tax credit.  Furthermore, the bill allows states and local districts full flexibility in determining the school construction or modernization project.

The Republican leaders have made a  "two for me, one for needy schools" offer.  They would give only about one-third of the amount that the president originally requested to school modernization bonds while giving twice as much to Republican tax breaks that do not help the communities most in need.  I do not believe this is a serious attempt at negotiating in a bipartisan way.  It is more likely an attempt on behalf of the Republican leadership to assuage those in their own party who know we must do something more to help build new schools.